What Are They Offering?

I’m sure it happens with every toddler if given the chance…and, well, Micah is no exception I guess. Of course we want to instill good habits into our little guy so why not start young.  Besides, Micah is always looking for things to do during church services. Therefore, when the offering “plate” comes by I like to ask Micah if he will give back to God the offering on behalf of our family.

 

Before Micah really understood the idea of putting money into the little pouch on a stick, I had a well planned strategy. I needed to get the money out of my pocket without prematurely drawing his attention to it. Then, I had to reveal and give it to him with enough to look at it himself, but yet not too much time so that he would lose interest and throw it on the ground. At the same time, I needed to keep my hand in close proximity to his so that when the pouch came, I could gently move his hand over the basket and tell him to let go. As soon as the birr (that’s the currency here) fell into the darkness, the usher (or mommy) would pull the pouch away before his curious fingers could latch on. We practiced this routine for a couple weeks before it seemed Micah was beginning to understand what he was doing. We knew we had to entrust him with a bit more responsibility, and on that third Sunday, he didn’t let us down. As the offering began, I gave him the birr a bit earlier letting him hold it on his own, though still seemingly unaware of what it was for. But, aha!, when that basket appeared in front of his nose, he knew exactly what to do. He slam dunked the birr and glanced up over his shoulder at us with a goofy smile. We smiled back with much-earned parental pride. Well, you know what Scripture says, “pride comes before a fall.”

 

Week four’s offering time came Christmas Sunday and I took out the birr with no attempt at hiding it. Micah of course reached for it with gusto and, recognizing what it was for, turned and looked around the room to spot the offering collector. There he was, off to our right holding the familiar pouch into which Micah’s treasure was awaiting deposit. Micah, with a serious concentration the whole time, was all business and didn’t take his eye off of the offering pouch as it made its way around the circle toward our bench (Gmz church is always in a big circle). As it drew near, Micah stretched out his birr-clenching fist in anticipation and both Andrea and I relaxed in victory as our little guy was so picture-perfectly doing it all by himself. The smiles on our faces grew as the pouch now floated directly under Micah’s offering. A pause…and my peripherals alerted me to trouble, the every so slight raising of Micah’s nose so as to peer into the darkness of the offering bag. At precisely that moment, I saw Micah’s right hand launch out from his side like a missile and without releasing its treasure, the left hand retracted to give room for the right hand to pass and plummet deep into the purse! And believe me, with a well planed and perfectly executed plan like that, he wasn’t just trying to make change!

 

The heist was going just as his little mind had rehearsed it. He had played the “good soldier” for several weeks now, convincing his superiors that he was ready for a solo mission. Then, just when he was to pull the trigger on the target, he aborted and went AWOL.  And he may have gotten away with all the booty had he not miscalculated one minor detail – the reach of his stubby, little arm. Despite being fully extended, those grubby little fingers pifered only the air a good two inches above the coins resting at the bottom of the pouch. Sadly, there was no time for repositioning in the milliseconds before the long arm of the law – in this case, daddy’s - cuffed onto his chubby wrist – busted!

 

After a quick system reboot inside Micah’s brain, he remembered the original task. And so, like the good boy we’ve grown to trust, he reached out his left hand and released his grip over the still-hovering offering pouch. The Gmz usher couldn’t help but smile as he moved on around the circle. Neither could we. Either Micah is a good boy at times derailed by simple curiosity, or he is a brilliant mastermind of complex schemes who plans to one day take over the world (do I hear the Pinky and the Brain theme song?). We’re proud of him either way.

Hey! You Peeps Wanna S'more?

Bondage, my reason and will are locked in a jail cell leaving my decisions and actions free to fly wherever the wind might take them. It’s an addiction, I know, but the Bible says nothing specifically about the sinful combination of fluffy, white sugar, rich melted cocoa beans with sugar and crispy baked grains (and sugar I’m sure). Then again, maybe it does. We don’t really know for sure what “manna” is, do we? Could not s’mores be the heavenly bread given by God himself to sustain the Israelites through those long wilderness years? No doubt, they cooked on campfires which limits the choices down to hobo dinners and, well, s’mores. Hmmm…that could make a good dissertation topic if I ever get talked into a PhD program. Maybe I’ll start researching now.

Thankfully, I married a woman who can not only enjoy a nice evening under the stars serenaded by the crackle of a campfire (yes Derek, a “crackle” not a ROAR!), but she also enjoys a good s’more along with me. Granted she doesn’t keep pace to see who gets the sugar-saturated stomach ache first, but she also doesn’t daintily stop after one, claiming to not want anymore (like I ever believe that hogwash!).

Now, back in the States, we were introduced to the best thing since sliced bread – s’mores with Reese’s PB Cups instead of Hershey Chocolate. Are you with me? Anytime you add peanut butter to chocolate you have a winning combination! Now, unfortunately, we can’t buy Reese’s here in Ethiopia, but then again we can’t buy marshmallows or graham crackers here either, so we are entirely dependent on the outside world for satisfaction of our addiction. Micah has given us a great excuse for receiving graham crackers as they are surely sandwiched in between Cheerios and Goldfish as the three most popular kids’ snacks! So we’ve been well-stocked with “graham” after both of Micah’s grandparents’ visits in 2010 and 2011. Reese’s? Once again care packages and visitors have given us this crucial ingredient in making the ultimate S’more. But marshmallows, well, at times, we’ve been scraping bottom in this category. Recently, at our last campfire on New Year’s Day, we had to break out the brown, orange and white marshmallows shaped like little ghosts. Then, there was the chocolate and mint swirl marshmallows brought to us this past summer. Believe me, there’s a reason why Reese’s never came out with a “Mint Peanut Butter Cup.” The most memorable was shortly after Easter last year, when a care package arrived with some bright yellow “Peeps.” Sure, as a kid, Peeps are good and fun to eat. But, as our taste buds mature into the ability to discern the finer sweets in life, Peeps quickly fall by the wayside. But, when we are all out of marshmallows on a campfire night – what else could we do?

Impaling that little bunny head onto my clothes hanger, I extended its ears into the flame, watching closely as the smiling face began to lose definition. The crystallized sugar on the outside soon melted to form a shell, protecting the fluffy sugar on the inside from expanding as in regular s’more roasting. Given enough time in close proximity to the flame, I felt my Peep was properly toasted and, with the help of my lovely assistant, carefully constructed a picture perfect s’more (well, apart from the yellow ears sticking out). When the masterpiece finally hit my tongue, my taste buds immediately set up a protest. Whew! A s’more probably twice as sweet as the average one; I can’t say that I preferred it, although I did manage to eat a second before the sweetness got the better of me.

Yea, 2012! But when?

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Knowing that Andrea would never even entertain the idea of staying up to ring in the New Year, I thought to myself on January 31st, "Should I line up some things to do until the clock strikes its first 'dong' of 2012?" Yea, that could be fun, I could watch an M. Night Shyamalan movie, or do some story writing during those quiet hours. Of course it wouldn't be anything like being at home where we would certainly be popping Old Wisconsin "little smokies" (baby sausages) to chase down the Piggly Wiggly cheese platter and Townhouse crackers. We might even go all out and heat up some spiced apple cider and watch a "Blues Brothers" movie between shots in a never ending streak of pool games.

Huh, the more I thought about what would be happening at home, the more I began to question the point of me staying up….staying up until what? The Ethiopian calendar celebrates its New Year in our month of September, so there certainly isn't any cultural hype over our January 1st. But that's them, I suppose I should stay true to my culture and stay up to midnight by my watch, but still I question, what "event" am I really celebrating? If the New Year begins when my current time zone hits 0:00, then I suppose it is entirely relative on where I am, for at home the party would just barely be getting started (midnight here is 3pm there). Then the thought crossed my mind, why don't I get a good night sleep, wake up and celebrate the New Year "with" my family at their midnight. That seems a bit more reasonable except that it's really hard to be excited, counting down the minutes to 9am. I guess I should have been better prepared for such an entirely relative celebration, for as lo
ng as I remember, I have been watching the TV for some silly ball to drop in Times Square and a whole lot of hoopla only to mark one hour to go for us in the Central time zone.

In the end, the decision was made for me. For whatever it was that we ate for dinner on the so called New Year's Eve, didn't sit well with either Andrea or I and boy did our stomachs complain about it. With only one bathroom in the house, we certainly gave it no rest for a good hour. After the dust had settled a bit, we were both pooped out, and happily hit the hay at our normal bedtime.